October = Dahlias
Category: Harvest
Calendula Salve
This year, I am collecting and drying calendula flowers again to make salve. I am air-drying the flowers on paper plates in a darkened room for about three weeks and then transfer them to a large mason jar for storage.
I still had dried flowers from last year (about 3 cups, loosely packed) and decided to use them up first. To make the calendula oil, I added 16 oz. of sweet almond oil to these dried flowers, covering them about 3/4 in the jars. I let them extract for seven weeks (six would have been enough), from August 7 though today, September 26.
I then strained the oil through a sieve, this time omitting the cheese cloth, as I wanted to try to minimize loss by absorption. The flowers absorb a good amount, as does the cheese cloth. From my initial 16 oz. of oil, I got around 13 oz. The flowers were densely packed in the extraction jars, so I decided to just dilute the calendula oil with pure almond oil to bring the volume back up to 16 oz.
Over a water bath, I melted 2 oz. of beeswax and 1 oz. of shea butter. Once melted, I slowly added the 16 oz. of calendula oil, making sure to not heat the oil too much. Just enough for it to melt. I then added 16 drops of essential lavender oil and filled the salve into 8 2 oz.-tins. Ready!
September Greens, September Flowers
Early September Plot in Pictures
A Medley of Summer Harvests
Here are a few pictures of some of my harvests from mid-July through the end of August. Notably absent are tomatoes, despite having 12 (!) tomato plants. Thanks, rats and birds 🙁
August Mini-Bouquet
First Tomatoes
Finally, my first vine-ripened tomatoes of the season! I already picked two blushing, green ones to ripen on the counter, but these two are the real deal. One Mountain Sunrise and one Caiman. These are the first two that I harvested after covering whatever the rats left on the vines with those wire mesh bags. It seems to be working. I hope to get at least a few handfuls from my 12 plants.
Getting the Garlic Ready for Storage
Last night, after three weeks of curing, I cleaned my garlic and prepped it for storage. For the hardnecks, I just clean off the dirt and the outermost papery skin, cut off the stems and root hairs and placed them in a ceramic crock to live in my pantry for the coming months. I will use those up first as hardnecks do not keep as well as softnecks.
I also braided the softneck garlic and added a few strawflowers for decoration. The braid now hangs in my pantry. As always, I saved the two largest heads of each type (4 heads total) as seed garlic. I will plant those cloves in early November for next year’s harvest.
Pesto
First round of pesto in the freezer! Last night I processed the basil I had harvested the day before and made pesto. I still had garlic scapes in the fridge, and used a few of those plus pine nuts, olive oil and salt. To make the pesto more versatile and to be considerate of pesto lovers in my circle who cannot have dairy, I did not add cheese. Cheese can always be added later. I then froze the pesto in ice cube trays and transferred the (ten) frozen cubes to Ziplock bags this morning to freeze for the longer term.
Shallot Braids
I braided some of my shallots today, and added a few strawflowers from last year’s garlic braid. This year’s strawflowers are not quite ready yet. I am so excited to have them hanging in my pantry with the drying herbs.
